Man shot dead by police at CU-Boulder was former Marine discharged under questionable circumstances
The Denver Channel
Blair Miller, Sally Mamdooh
Oct 7, 2016
BOULDER, Colo. – The University of Colorado Police Department named the two officers involved in the fatal shooting of a man wielding a machete on campus Wednesday as it came to light the man was a former Marine.
Brandon Simmons, 28, of Thornton, allegedly threatened a sports medicine patient with a machete at CU-Boulder Wednesday before police confronted him and eventually shot him dead.
Friends of Simmons’ on Friday told Denver7 he was a former Marine who was discharged earlier this year after around a decade of service. Simmons had two children and an ex-wife, who all live in California, where Simmons used to be stationed.
Friends say he recently moved in with his father in Thornton after the divorce.
Simmons had been a drill instructor during his time in the Marines. A friend of his said he was the "epitome" of what a good drill instructor should be and called the incident and Simmons' death "shocking."
A photo of Simmons posted to Facebook publicly by a friend shows Simmons in his Marines dress uniform, with sergeant bars on his sleeve.
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Once in a while someone says something completely stupid about PTSD. While they may care about the troops and our veterans, it becomes obvious they did not care enough to learn much about them.
When folks lined up to start repeating "22 a day" and how they were raising awareness, I'd argue with them about the numbers and what the VA report actually said. That was when I'd hear the words that made me hang up the phone. "Its just a number" they said defending their use of someone else's anguish.
So how is it they survived combat but could not survive when they were back home?
We may see them as heroes, but they say they were just doing their jobs. We may see them as victims, but they see themselves as survivors. We may see them as someone to feel sorry for but they discovered the truth and found the power within all they still had to give.
From Residual War, Something Worth Living For by Kathie Costos DiCesare
FIRST NIGHT
LEVERAGE’S ROOM
Alarm clock shows 3:15 near the window where she is standing looking out.
The soldiers were in their rooms.
Michaels paces the floor
Alvarez is sleeping with his machine gun by his side.
Franklin is sitting on the side of the bed. Elbows on knees, head down in his hands.
Daniel's room was empty
Shultz is in bed with glow of cell phone on his face.
Bean and Murray are sleeping in the same bed. Bean has arm around Murray as his legs are moving and he is whimpering.
Daniels is walking around as if on patrol.
Faith is in fetal position, shaking with tears coming out of his eyes.
The next day all of them were talking about how they ended up at Fort Christmas. Each one of them had proven themselves as heroic and human. They had heard all the rumors about PTSD but they survived the causes while idiots spread gossip.
"So you see ma’am every one of us did something for the right reason without thinking about what the consequences would be because it had to be done."
"It had to be done" and it was done over and over again. They did it because everyone they served with in Afghanistan and Iraq were worth dying for. The trouble was, none of them had found something worth living for until someone else proved to them their own worth.
Vietnam vets relive war for students with straight talk at park
Worcester Telegram
Brad Petrishen
October 7, 2016
“We tell them, ‘Your questions are our therapy,’” Mr. Polaski said as Friday’s crop of students – 170 eighth-graders from Lowell – pulled up in four buses. “All’s we do is hope somebody remembers it.”
WORCESTER – “What was it like to kill your first person?” the first student asked Phil Madaio as the morning sun shone on the chiseled slabs of stone that forge the state’s Vietnam memorial.
“Not good,” the Vietnam veteran replied in a deep, gravelly voice. “But you can’t think about that long or you’ll be laying there next to him.”
Grim truths abounded Friday as four veterans shared their experiences at Green Hill Park. The sessions are not always easy, but the men, part of a local group called Vietnam Veterans for the Community, know that while granite lasts forever, they will not.
“It’s living history,” Casey Polaski, 68, told a collection of students gathered in front of the memorial’s seminal structure, a ring of granite slabs bearing the names of the 1,547 dead or missing soldiers from Massachusetts.
Dedicated in 2002, the memorial this summer was approved for $200,000 in repairs and $50,000 in annual maintenance. Mr. Madaio, Mr. Polaski and their friends are always shocked at how many people don’t know it exists; they offer tours here often, speaking for men who cannot, and sharing a burden they will always carry.
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We survived yesterday, a very long, long day behind boarded up windows. It was the 4th hurricane to hit Central Florida since we moved here. Today is clean up day and trying to get back to normal. We got lucky but folks on the coast were not lucky at all.
National Guard begins operations in Florida as Hurricane Matthew pushes north
STARS AND STRIPES
By COREY DICKSTEIN
Published: October 7, 2016
This photo from a Florida Department of Transportation traffic camera, which has become a hit on the internet, shows National Guard vehicles heading south to prepare to help residents in Hurricane Matthew's wake as evacuees move in the opposite direction.
Florida Department of Transportation
WASHINGTON – National Guard troops in Florida began initial search-and-rescue operations Friday in the southern parts of the state as powerful Hurricane Matthew moved up the East Coast toward Georgia and South Carolina.
Florida Gov. Rick Scott activated some 3,500 National Guard troops, who began aerial and ground-based search-and-rescue operations in the state’s southeast as the Category 3 hurricane moved slowly north along the coastline, said Air Force Maj. Gen. J.C. Witham, the National Guard Bureau’s operations director. In addition, thousands of Florida Guardsmen were on standby to deploy, if needed.
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This is from Jacksonville
You can also see what happened in Daytona Beach
Community Comes Together for Funeral of ‘Mystery Marine’ in Stafford County
NBC 4 News Washington
By David Culver and Chelsea Cirruzzo
October 6, 2016
A Virginia community came together on Thursday to say farewell to a local veteran known as the “Mystery Marine.”
Cpl. Mario Kletzke ran up and down Route 610 in Stafford County carrying the American flag in one hand and a POW flag in the other on every Fourth of July for the past three years.
Kletzke was nicknamed the Mystery Marine on social media after most residents struggled to identify the runner. There’s even a Facebook page called the “Stafford County Mystery Marine,” with photos of Kletzke in his green Marine shorts
“How didn’t I know?” family friend Janet Martel said of the true identity of the Mystery Marine.
Kletzke took his own life last week after suffering from PTSD. He was 23.
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